


Garrus Effect: Vigilante Vakarian

by Neo_Ethereal



Series: Garrus Effect [3]
Category: Mass Effect
Genre: Eden Prime, Gen, Science Fiction, Tuchanka, Vigilantism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-10
Updated: 2016-08-21
Packaged: 2018-07-22 19:07:57
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 6,864
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7450666
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Neo_Ethereal/pseuds/Neo_Ethereal
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Six months after Commander Shepard was declared killed in action in the Terminus Systems, Garrus Vakarian continues on with his new life as a vigilante, taking it upon himself to right the galaxy's wrongs. His latest lead for stopping the shipment of tainted element zero across Citadel space takes him to the agrarian human colony, Eden Prime.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Eden Prime

Life was still far from normal for the humans on Eden Prime, the place where the geth invasion began. It was getting close now to the one year anniversary of the original attack, where the colony was nearly destroyed. Were it not for Commander Shepard and the crew of _SSV Normandy_ , Saren's plan to annihilate the human settlement here would've succeeded.

Garrus found it amusing that some of the first establishments to be back up and running in this planet's capitol city, Constant, were the bars. The farms were operational again, mostly, but in the cities, unless you needed to use the spaceport or get drunk, there wasn't much to do. He was pretty keen on the latter option at the moment, though he feared there wasn't enough turian-friendly alcohol available to do the job.

While he waited for the flustered and overly unfriendly human barkeep to get him another round, Garrus flipped through some data on his omni-tool. He'd put together an interactive hit list of sorts, with threads of data connecting one target or dossier to another. In between his prime suspect, Jaroth, and the various lowlifes Garrus had killed in the last few months, there was a wealth of dead-end leads, cronies, and unknowns. Where did this Jaroth operate? Was he getting his eezo from Omega, from batarian space, or somewhere else in the Terminus? Who were his cohorts? Who could actually help him infiltrate the network of these shipments? These questions pestered him every day. 'Sure, maybe I could just barge into Omega and start shooting everyone who might be remotely linked to this guy. But how far would that get me?'

Through his thick skin and armor, he barely noticed a slap on his back. Then there was a plopping sound as someone sat in the stool next to him. His left eye caught notice of this person; through the glow of his visor, which was now orange, he gathered that it was a human. Female. No one he recognized. _Or should I? Maybe this swill is actually working._ He grunted some form of acknowledgement to her, then re-focused on his hit list.

"Ya know, round these parts people still say hello to each other."

Garrus didn't look over, but the cheerfulness in her voice suggested that she was smiling. "Sorry human. I don't think you're the person I'm here to see." He wondered now what was taking so long with his third-- or was it fourth?-- drink.

"Did it occur to you that maybe this person, let's just call him a friend, might not be joining you? Vakarian."

Now she had his attention. He turned around his stool, an awkward thing to do when it wasn't meant to accommodate turian legs. "I don't know that name. But we need to have a discussion. Not here." He called up his open tab via omni-tool, tapped "pay," then grabbed the human by the arm, leading her outside. Snapped out of his daydream now, he took a second to reconnoiter her appearance. Her complexion was youthful, mixed in coloration as most humans were now, her hair a bit of a sloppy, tangled mess of black that covered part of her face. She had on some kind of beige cap, made of some nebulous cloth. Her light, petite spacesuit looked like a pastiche of different manufacturers' armors, with a mismatch of reds, browns and purples. She didn't have any obvious weapons that he could see, but he wouldn't take any chances in the event she was a biotic.

"Easy there, soldier. The First Contact War is over." Her tone remained oddly cheerful, almost playful, as Garrus led her outside.

When he was satisfied that no one inside could overhear, he let go of her arm. There was enough ambient noise outside to put him more at ease against curious ears. "Where did you hear that name?"

She snickered. "Oh come on. Any dolt with half a wit could recognize your face paint. And just cause you change your visor color, mix your armor up a bit, you think no one can tell that you're Garrus Vakarian?"

He groaned an annoyed sort of grunt. Truth be told he wasn't too fond of his current suit, an orange Devlon Industries set of light turian armor. He missed wearing his favorite cobalt blue color, but he wanted to deflect attention away from his identity until news of his disappearance cooled off on the extranet. "So you have me at a disadvantage. Now tell me why my friend won't be making it?"

"Oh he's dead, Garrus. Spaced."

"That's a shame. I was hoping my friend might be delivering me some good news." Truth was, Garrus didn't care that this "friend" was dead. He wasn't much of one. He was a courier for the Shadow Broker, an unsavory one at that. All that mattered was the information he possessed...

"It's okay, soldier. I have some good news for you too. But it's on a datapad, you see. Locked up tight, nice and secure, off the net so that no one can spoil it for you, see? I can take you to where that is."

Buzzed as he was, his caution was overridden by impatience. "Fine, let's go."

"Nah. Not yet. Meet me at nightfall. At a special place."

"What, no hint? No coordinates? What special place?"

"The Shepard monument, of course. What else about this droll little colony is special?"

"I don't know about that. What's your name, friend of a friend?"

"Dash. Nice to meet ya, Vakarian. I'll be seeing ya later, I'm sure."

* * *

As the star, Utopia, disappeared from Eden Prime's sky, the verdant green landscape all but disappeared from Garrus's sight. He walked through the grass, alongside an incomplete monorail leading away from Constant. The never finished expansion to this rail system is what led the humans to uncovering the Prothean beacon, and what set in motion the events which brought Commander Shepard here. The original Prothean excavation site, as well as the area where Sovereign landed were now off-limits, under around the clock guard by the Systems Alliance, but the Shepard monument nearby was open to all.

Erected on the cliffside where she and her squad first disembarked from _Normandy_ , the statue in her honor overlooked an impressive stretch of Eden grasslands and hills. A persistent mass effect barrier kept her detractors from damaging or defacing it. Shortly after the Battle of the Citadel, one would've found flowers, dedication plaques, and other tributes left here. Now there was precious little here beside the statue itself, as if it had been forgotten, relegated to just maybe one brief stop for an Eden Prime tour guide.

Garrus lowered his new Thunder assault rifle for a moment, as he glared up at the statue. At about four meters tall, it was an impressive recreation. _S_ _till, it pales compared to the real thing. She was a lot more beautiful than that, too. Her, hair, was nicer..._

"Right on time, Vakarian!"

He brought his rifle back up to attention. Thermal scans in his visor revealed a shape exactly like the woman he'd encountered earlier. She still had no weapons he could detect. "I'm always on time, and on target. You have what I need?"

"Oh you betcha. But..."

Garrus groaned. "There's always a but. Why can this never just be simple? What is it you want, Dash?"

He picked up a little sparkle, as her smile reflected in the dim moonlight. "A piece of the action."

"Do you even know what kind of action that is?"

"Oh I do, soldier. You're after the scum of the galaxy, livin' just below the surface of 'civilization,' feedin' off us decent folk. The people your old bosses knew 'bout but wouldn't lift a finger to touch. Too many credits across too many greased palms, you know?"

"Are you... asking to join me?" His heart wanted to believe that there was finally one person out here who didn't want to see him dead, but experience told him not to trust her.

"Nah. I mean not for good, you know, but maybe for this one job. You see, our mutual friend was into some worse shit than you knew. I'm the one who spaced him. Some random-ass backwater in the Traverse, no way it'll get traced back to either of us. I have all the data he did, right here. But if I give this to you, the target that's in here along with the intel, see, I'm going to have to be there when you take him on." Her smile grew wider as she handed the data pad over to him. "It's important that we cooperate on this one, because as you'll see, we have a mutual acquaintance tied into all this." Garrus could just barely see her wink at him.

"And who is that?"

She chuckled in a whimsical sort of way. "Urdnot Wrex, silly."


	2. Scoped and Dropped

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Garrus's new life as a vigilante grows more complicated as he tries to track down Urdnot Wrex, a surprising lead in his hunt for smugglers of tainted eezo. The problem he faces now is getting to the famous krogan mercenary alive.

The sizzle of an EMP overload marked Garrus's arrival in the CIC of the starship _Boundless Courtesy_ , a former hanar vessel commandeered by a Blue Suns merc group. Two mercs had their kinetic barriers dropped instantly. Before they could recover from the shock, Garrus stepped through the door, taking each human out with expert headshots from his Thunder rifle. His visor added the shots to his tally, one he'd started since leaving C-Sec.

_24 headshots as a vigilante. I must be slipping. Shepard would've had more, I'm sure._

Vakarian ran a quick thermal scan of the room. No one else was here in the CIC, but he could still hear the report of weapons fire below deck. He tapped on his omni-tool. "Dash, do you read? What's your status?"

A brief crackle preceded her reply. "Just shiny here soldier! Though I could do with a little more firepower if ya care to join in!"

"I think I'll take you up on that. Hang tight." He hustled back out of the CIC and to the ship's central confluence. Skipping the laboriously slow elevator, he opted for the emergency stairs. Running over the dead or incapacitated bodies of other Blue Suns mercs, mostly human and batarian, he joined the fray in _Courtesy's_ cargo hold. Dash had the ground held for the moment, directing a pair of hijacked LOKI mechs against the Blue Suns from behind a stack of heavy crates. To Garrus's amazement she worked two omni-tools at once, using the second one to fire EMP and sabotage mines at the merc flanks.

There were three of them that Garrus could see. Two humans and a krogan. The latter would make for an interesting encounter, for sure. He took the few seconds of surprise on his side to ready his Mantis rifle. Knowing the krogan would laugh off all but the most perfect shot through the eye, Vakarian opted to blow away the human on his left. With his shields already fried, the merc's helmet and head exploded into a mess of blood, bone and plastic.

Garrus dove forward to take cover below a safety barrier as accelerated metal flew toward him. A few rounds hit the top of his shields, sending an unpleasant feedback through his armor. _Damn, they're pretty good shots to have hit me that fast. Or just lucky._

The now armless LOKI mechs still brazenly closed with the mercs, oblivious to the fact that they now posed no threat. Even so, the krogan merc took his chance to indulge some aggression, charging at one mech crest first, pulverizing its torso. Then he grabbed the second mech by the head, ripping it in two entirely by hand. He let out a war cry even as Garrus took a few decent potshots at him from cover. Dash leaned out long enough to fire a neural shock probe at the krogan, only to have it deflect harmlessly off of his shimmering blue armor. He smiled through his yellow teeth as he charged into the crates protecting Dash; Garrus watched as they began to buckle.

Garrus's visor still had the other human's position pegged. He took a gamble on his shields holding out and popped out of cover. As he hoped, the merc opened fire, and as he prayed, his shields held out just enough. Just enough, for Garrus to scope and drop a now very dead mercenary.

What he did next surprised even himself. Throwing his sniper rifle to the side, he grabbed a talon dagger from the mag-clip on his back where most troops kept their shotguns. He full-on charged the krogan, leaping dagger first toward the giant's huge brown crest. The blade missed its mark, instead scraping against armor and tough scale. Garrus and his adversary crumpled to the ground, the former landing atop the latter. He heard the krogan laugh again as he smashed Garrus in the cheek with an armored fist. A human would likely have had a bone broken from that kind of punch, but Garrus's tough turian face stayed intact. He couldn't reach back for his assault rifle quickly enough as he reeled from the blow, but he did react quickly enough to launch another EMP from his omni-tool. The blast took the krogan dead center in the face, forcing him to roll away.

Dash leapt in as Garrus recoiled from the blast. With two shock darts readied on each hand, she climbed up the krogan's hump, sticking both neural paralyzers into his thick neck. The beast of a merc shook and thrashed as he desperately tried to fight back. Even with his redundant nervous system, he was reduced to a crawl. That was enough time for Garrus to push a gun to his head and pull the trigger until it overheated.

* * *

Back in _Courtesy's_ CIC, Garrus grimaced as he inspected his assault rifle. The heat sink was blown out and the barrel had taken significant damage.

"You oughta use thermal clips, ya know," Dash offered as she glanced over at him from the main communications console. "Keeps you away from nasty problems like that."

"I'll have you know that I helped Shepard stop Saren with guns just like this, thank you." His mandibles twitched. He then remembered that Shepard had access to top of the line weaponry from both the Alliance and the Spectre stocks. They fared better in the field than these run of the mill weapons from the Traverse and Terminus.

"Whatever big man. Just tryin' to be a help. Could be that I want to say thanks for coverin' my ass back there."

He didn't look back at her, instead returning his attention to the cargo manifest, downloaded to his omni-tool. "Anyway. You were right about the red sand. I'll put out a beacon to your contact, after he comes through with those credits he promised." He groaned under his breath. He needed credits more badly now than any other time in his life. He hadn't eaten more than a few turian-friendly protein packs since leaving Eden Prime.

"Sounds cool soldier. What else you got over there?"

"Hmm. Mostly boring lists of weapons and mods. Most of it legal. I still don't see anything about eezo."

"I figured that'd probably be it. Can't make it too easy." Dash giggled lightly. "I'm surprised you ain't put two and two together yet, Vakarian."

He glanced over at her. "What do you mean? Why should I put two numbers together...?"

She rolled her eyes. "Jesus, you turians can be so damn stiff. Even when you go rogue. I figured when I dropped Wrex's name back planetside you'd have reacted more. Everyone not living under a moon knows you two were with Shepard."

"So?"

"He's the one who hired us. Well, me. He doesn't know you're involved. I mean, not YOU, the one and only Garrus. Far as he knows there's some asshole turian heavy along for the ride to get some credits." She brushed a lock of hair back under her cap.

"Interesting." Some gears began to turn in his head, but he kept his outward expression stoic. "And somehow Wrex knows who I need to look for, who will lead me to my... targets?"

"Yep. I mean that's what he said. He figured what he knows might make some good currency in your circles. Funny how small the galaxy can be, ain't it?"

Garrus's stomach gurgled to remind him how empty it was. His jaw and cheekbones stung with fierce heat. He didn't care about sentiment right now. He wanted only a few things now: a new gun, some hot food, a place to sleep for at least one night cycle, and the location for Jaroth. He frowned at Dash when he knew that none of those things were immediately available. Closing out the cargo manifest on his omni-tool, he started playing with the helm controls in front of him. The ship had been refit but was still built with hanar in mind. The helm controls were a tall and impractical set of levers and holographic dials on a silverish pedestal. Working these as well as he could, Garrus limped the ship into a far flung orbit of the nearby planet...

Tuchanka.


	3. Like Old Times

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Garrus Vakarian and Urdnot Wrex. Originally brought together by Commander Shepard in the fight against Saren, these two men from different species reunite in an exchange of favors that will send them toward their ultimate destinies.

Once, on an assignment during his mandatory military service, Garrus had been to the krogan homeworld, Tuchanka. It was not among his more pleasant memories.

Following instructions passed along to Dash, she and Garrus purposely crash-landed the _Boundless Courtesy_ in the wastelands around the settlement for clan Urdnot. The ship made it past the turian patrols in the Krogan DMZ by running dark most of the way, letting Tuchanka's gravity do much of the work.

The turian emerged from the fresh wreckage with a bold arrogance, his Mantis rifle propped up over his shoulder. He held his head up brazenly high despite the stinging, nauseatingly strong Tuchanka air. The party of krogan waiting for him, all armed with spike throwers, shard launchers and other improvised krogan weapons, snarled at him in greeting. All except the one at their head, one unmistakable Urdnot Wrex, his scarred, flaming crest reflecting the fierce Tuchanka sun. His wide lips curled into a smirk. "Why if it isn't Garrus. You sneaky little pyjak."

"Good to see you too, Wrex," he replied, keeping his usual cool, professional tone. "Funny though, I thought you said once you'd never come back to this place."

Wrex drew in a long, baritone breath. "Sometimes, when you save the galaxy, your perspective can change. Traveling with someone like Shepard also has a way of making you... re-evaluate your situation."

"She did have that effect on us. So I'm here, and behind me is a cache of weapons that I'm sure you'll find to your liking."

"Ah Garrus, still walking around with a stick shoved firmly up your turian ass. Don't come here and talk about all this like it's just some other mission." He slapped Garrus hard on the shoulder, enough to throw him off balance. "Hah! Come on, we're gonna have a nice, long chat. The rest of these friendly krogan warriors you see here will take care of the goods." He looked over at Dash, who stood there literally twiddling her thumbs behind her back. "You too little one. Don't pretend that you're not happy to see me." She beamed a smile at him through her breather mask and waved.

The three of them strolled, at least that's how Wrex described it, through a blasted ruin of concrete and steel that clan Urdnot called home. To Garrus it was a seemingly random mess of what used to be buildings or fortifications, but Wrex knew it as if it were some kind of neighborhood. "So Garrus. You finally had enough of C-Sec, huh? I thought Shepard talked you into going back. Then you could take long walks, hold hands and talk about hard your life is with everyone else on the Citadel."

"I did go back, for a time." He finally decided to stow his rifle. "When it became clear to me that they weren't taking the Reapers seriously, I left."

Wrex let out another of his deep groans, the kind you could almost feel through your feet from the rumbling bass he emanated. "Bunch of fools. Shove a big metal monster into their face and they'll still deny that it's real. Hmm. What's the term you humans use for that, Dash?"

"Fuck 'em," she offered with a smile.

"Haha! That! I like it." Wrex kicked a piece of broken truck wheel out of the way. "So here you are now, a mercenary. How are you enjoying this life, Vakarian?"

"I prefer the term vigilante. To answer your question, it's... not what I thought it would be."

"That's called reality, kid. Better get used to it. I was living off of merc jobs since before you were shoved out of your mother. I have scars older than you, by the way. But I know you, Garrus. You're someone who sees a problem and wants to fix it; you don't give a damn if rules or policies get in the way. Take that whole thing with Saren. You and I both saw a big, fat problem with his name on it. We did what had to be done. So did Shepard."

"Somehow Wrex, I'm always surprised by your insight and how quickly you can break down a situation. But Shepard is dead. Now it's up to me to clean up this galaxy's messes."

"Hmm. I heard a rumor about that. She's really dead, huh? Figured that story was just a pile of shit."

Garrus frowned, his mandibles flexing back to show most of his teeth. "I wish it were. The Alliance and the Council both declared her KIA in the Terminus systems. They sent her out there, trying to hunt down geth."

"She wouldn't have been beaten by a bunch of those synthetic bastards."

"I don't know all the details, but whatever happened took the Normandy down with her. Only some of the crew survived."

"Well Garrus, and no offense little one, I don't think the humans will make another one like her for some time. I'll raise my next drink to her."

"Yeah." Vakarian powered his visor down and stopped in his tracks. "So what am I doing here? What is all of this? I just smuggled a ship full of weapons, red sand and blast through the Krogan DMZ for you."

Wrex gave him a hearty laugh. "Red sand? Blast? Kid, we'll use those as seasoning on thresher steaks. The weapons are all I care about. Since you turians decided to go and disarm us, remember? I needed some extra firepower to help take this place back."

"This?" Garrus looked around, expecting that he must've missed something besides the piles of rock around him.

"I mean Tuchanka. If Saren proved one thing, it's that the krogan will only continue to be exploited if we keep living like this. We'll die out, slowly. I have a plan to unite the clans and kick the krogan species in its ass, to focus on breeding instead of killing each other or living as hired muscle. To get there, clan Urdnot will have to take back its home base from clan Gatatog."

"So that's why you hired Dash?"

Wrex gave the krogan equivalent to a shrug. "More or less. She's one of the best hackers I've come across, and little one, she knows who else to look for in her circles to get a job done. And look at what she found. Garrus Vakarian, vigilante. She tells me that you're on the hunt for some rather unlikable characters."

"Yes. You know who I'm looking for?"

"Not directly. But I know someone out on Omega who owes me a favor. Or maybe she just owes me a drink. Either way, you're going to be talking to Aleena. She knows how to find every scumbag on her side of the galaxy. Since you helped me out with my little problem, once we're done here I'll go with you in person to cash in what she owes me."

Garrus rubbed his chin. "I figured I would at least have heard that name before. Who is she?"

The krogan cracked a big smile. "You probably know her better as Aria T'Loak, ruler of Omega. Of course, since the ship you rode in on is now our latest pile of rubble, we'll need to get you another ride off-world. Just so happens that the Gatatog have a few shuttles parked and ready to steal in their home base. You and the little one help me in the coming battle, and they're all yours."

 _Great,_ Garrus thought to himself, _j_ _ust what I needed. Getting involved in a krogan clan war. But, damn it... Wrex has connections with Aria? That could really get me somewhere._ He crossed his arms. "Okay Wrex, I'm in. Just... tell me something. Do you have anything I can eat here?"

A thoughtful look washed over Wrex's face. "...you like salarian liver?"


	4. Life of a Mercenary

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Trapped for the time being on Tuchanka, Garrus tries to make the best of his situation, and learns a few things about his new partner's history.

His dextro rations were low. Wrex supplied Garrus and Dash with something he likened to the Tuchanka equivalent of seaweed, "one of the few plants around here that doesn't bite," but it was nasty to the taste and doing no favors for Vakarian's stomach. This was the centerpiece of his thoughts at the moment, not the krogan whose head he just destroyed with a shot from his rifle.

Garrus and Dash were hunkered down atop a destroyed bunker, effectively secluded from the krogan onslaught taking place on the plains below. Garrus took careful sniper shots against clan Gatatog from this excellent vantage point, enough to help Wrex but not quite so much as to draw unwanted attention. When the turian dropped back down into cover to allow his Mantis time to cool, Dash was there next to him, plugs stuck into her ears that he assumed was for listening to something. Music, perhaps, if she was anything like him.

"Another headshot," she asked, not bothering to look at him.

"Yeah," he offered with little satisfaction. "I have to think at some point they'll get tired of this and flee the field. Wrex's forces already have the upper hand."

"That's real special, soldier. Can't say I'll be too sorry when we get to leave."

Garrus set his rifle aside, looking over at this petite human with some condescension. "You're the reason we're involved in this, in case you forgot. Spirits, how'd you even get mixed up with a character like Wrex to begin with?"

She let her head slump over onto her right shoulder as she rolled her eyes, something Garrus had seen human teenagers do quite often in their vids. "I don't wanna get into that, really."

Garrus mockingly choked. "You're kidding."

"Fine. The whole point of this was to find Urek, the big fuckin' bastard we killed on the ship. He killed my partner. Wrex knew how to find the guy. Enough said."

"That doesn't explain how you even knew Wrex. After the Battle of the Citadel, he wasn't exactly easy to find."

"Why you so curious, now of all times? All I wanted to do was talk when I first bumped into you. You decided to be an uptight asshole about everything. Now that I'm mindin' my own business when you should be blasting heads, you want to gab? Make up your mind, Vakarian!"

He slumped back further against his cover, a slab of concrete. "I don't have much fight in me right now. Maybe I would rather be back in that bar on Eden Prime. Talking. About... opinions, feelings. Things you humans obsess over too much."

"Come on. Like you don't care about those things too. Or does 'turian honor' trump that too?"

"We just tend to see the bigger picture."

"Tell that to the Council."

Garrus went to speak again, but stopped himself. "You... have a point."

She looked back over at him, her eyes softening with sympathy. "I met the big guy on the Citadel. This was the last time Normandy was ever docked there. I was one of those kids tryin' to push through the crowd to see Shepard before she left. None of us knew it was the last chance anyone would have."

He frowned.

"So I stumble around the wards, pissed off, bored. And who do I find slumped over in some random casino? Wrex. So I want to go up and talk to this guy, I mean, the stories he could tell! But he looks so fucking pissed, and at the same time like he's gonna pass out and take the table down with him. Then I notice some junkie run an omni-tool behind his belt, and I know somethin's up. He does too, but he's too drunk to do more than swipe at this guy."

"Sounds charming."

Dash finally smiled again. "Oh yeah. So I says to Wrex, 'I'll be right back.' Twenty minutes later, I'm back with the stolen credits, and there is video of this guy bangin' an asari prostitute all over the net. Turns out he was cheating on his wife. So Wrex, he brings me in close afterward, he's almost squeezing me to death, he says 'kid, you're alright. I owe you one. I would've had to kill for my next ryncol. C-Sec frowns on that.' It kinda devolved from there, but he still remembered that when I looked him up again."

"Interesting how you, a human, managed to 'look up' the legendary Urdnot Wrex."

"God damn you're dense sometimes Vakarian. Every big player in the galaxy is obsessed with Commander Shepard and her crew. The Spectres, the STG, Cerberus, they're all tryin' to keep tabs on what her friends are up to. A friend of a friend helped me hack into some of Kaidan Alenko's files. He's kinda an uptight asshole too, I can see why you got along. Anyway, found out how to reach Wrex that way. Then I stole my way across Citadel space, ripping off one drug dealer and mercenary after another until I got here."

"Impressive. I'm sure that made you a lot of friends with the mercs."

"Not any different than you splattering their brains all across the Traverse."

He chuckled. "I suppose. They were all scum. The galaxy is a safer place with them gone, but I'm not done yet."

"I know. Look soldier. I don't know how long I wanna hang in this life. I did what I had to do. Urek killed my partner. Probably ate her too, he was a sick fucking bastard. Now that justice is done, I wanna maybe put my skill into some legit work for once."

_That's what I'm fighting for. So kids like you can go about your lives, do some good in this galaxy without being harassed, murdered, sold into slavery, turned into junkies... or left as sitting ducks for the Reapers._

"Cover those ears better, Dash. It's about to get loud." Garrus stood up on a tired set of knees. He readied his Mantis rifle once more on his barricade, activated his incendiary mod, and steadied his scope on the next target down range. He pulled the trigger.

"Scoped and dropped."


	5. Recompense

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> His task on Tuchanka complete, Garrus heads to Omega for the first time.

The battle on Tuchanka ended decidedly in favor of clan Urdnot. True to his word, Wrex allowed Garrus and Dash use of one of clan Gatatog's shuttles. The thing was a poor, clunky copy of the Alliance's Kodiak, but it had a mass effect drive so it was good enough for the job. Wrex left behind a "dummy" in his place in the event anyone tracking his movements decided to be nosy. Changing out his classic red combat suit for a hulking silver set of Battlemaster armor, he joined the turian and the human on their journey. The flight to the mass relay was uneventful; turian patrols, lax as they had ever been in the Aralakh system, weren't much interested in chasing down any vehicles that weren't combat capable.

Eager to put Wrex's payout to good use, Garrus first insisted on jumping to the Balor system, returning to Caleston. There, he gorged himself at a dextro-friendly diner he'd come to fancy on his last visit to the moon. He also gladly ditched his orange/white Devlon armor, upgrading to a cobalt blue suit of heavy armor he'd eyed up previously in an uppity Haliat Armory shop. The previous owner, ostensibly, never used it in combat and instead liked to strut around the Citadel, pretending to be some kind of big general. The shoulders of this armor had a bird-like emblem above a set of gold bars. Garrus didn't recognize the design as anything from turian culture, but like so many things he came across since joining Shepard, he still found it intriguing.

After the re-supply, this is where Dash decided to part ways with Vakarian and Wrex. She seemed bittersweet as she told Garrus more about her old partner, and how they idolized Commander Shepard, "the woman who showed the galaxy that brains are just as good as brawn." Garrus felt his heart grow warmer as he finally got to see, first-hand, how his work as a vigilante affected a person's life in a good way. He knew that, no matter what C-Sec or Pallin would have to say, justice was done in killing that krogan mercenary, ending his campaign of drug running, slave taking, and human-focused bloodlust. He also felt that some semblance of sanity still remained in the galaxy, that he was not alone in holding to the belief that Shepard was a hero, that she was not delusional or traumatized by combat because of her "Reaper theory." A precious flame ignited in Garrus's heart, a thing he didn't have any stock in since he left C-Sec: hope. He wished the feisty young human the best of luck and the spirits' guidance in her future. She bypassed Wrex's handshake and gave the huge krogan a crushing hug. Wiping a tear from her cheek, she straightened her cap and wished the two men good fortune on their mission, offering for them to look her up sometime on the up and coming human colony, Freedom's Progress.

* * *

Garrus and Wrex didn't say much on the relay jumps between the Balor and Sahrabarik systems. Garrus took the chance to sleep, his belly full and satisfied for the first time in too long. He dreamed briefly of a battle he fought alongside Shepard and Wrex on the planet Agebinium, where he and the Commander competed to see how many of Elanos Haliat's thugs they could pick off before they could shoot back. Wrex stood aside and mostly just watched, laughing each time Vakarian or Shepard scored a killing blow, occasionally throwing a merc who got too close away from them with a biotic blast. Garrus had already been impressed by her before, but until then, he'd never seen anyone shoot like her in his life, human or otherwise.

He was startled out of his dream by a rough sensation of deceleration. He stumbled his way back to the cockpit to see the red mushroom shape of Omega on display before him. It was in so many ways the opposite of the Citadel, a dark, inelegant mishmash of conflicting architecture and dirty industry. "This is it, kid," Wrex declared in an uninterested sort of tone. "Omega. The galaxy's asshole."

"How charming."

"This brings me back. Had some good fights in this place."

"You still have enemies here Wrex?"

"Hmm. Let's hope so. Otherwise this'll be as boring as the Citadel. With those ponds full of water, and no fish to eat."

Wrex maneuvered the crusty shuttle into the closest dock he could find to Afterlife, what he described to Garrus as "the closest thing you'll find to a seat of power here." He and Vakarian wasted no time disembarking. They were greeted in a matter of seconds by a cadre of batarian and turian heavies, doing their best to look mean. They all carried assault rifles and belts full of grenades. The head of this pack, a batarian who looked like he'd taken one too many stimpaks of steroids, spoke up. "Urdnot Wrex. And some random turian asshole. Welcome to Omega. Aria demands that you present yourselves... now."

"Is this the usual way to greet new arrivals," Garrus asked, not intending to be sarcastic.

"It is if Aria says so," the batarian growled. "Afterlife now, or die where you stand."

Wrex groaned. "Don't get your balls in a vice, junior. We'll go see the queen."

The duo was led through the nexus of Omega, where Garrus was able to see the truly downtrodden of the galaxy for the first time. This made the wards look tame. Members of every species, from human to vorcha and everything in between, slummed around here, begging for creds or doing their best to sell scraps and junk to travelers and mercenaries alike. The place was a choking, at times claustrophobic mix of steam, holograms, rusty lighting, and the throbbing of distant mining engines. That hum was overcome by the droning of electric bass as they drew closer to Afterlife. Here, the streets opened up, freeing Garrus of the sensation of being trapped. The entourage strolled past the line of citizens waiting to get by a stalwart elcor bouncer. Wrex moved about with a slow, steady confidence, but Garrus found himself instinctively winding himself up tight, ready to spring into action at the slightest threat.

The lights and music inside Afterlife itself were nauseatingly powerful. He could smell the rampant stink of alcohol and sex. His eyes spotted the worst criminals in the galaxy getting polluted beyond reason, or ogling the asari dancers who were all in various states of undress. He and Wrex were led to the top of Afterlife, the couch overlooking the whole bar like an oversized throne. The blue queen herself sat upon it, one leg crossed over the other, her arms wrapped around two asari dancers. She smacked each of them on the back when she saw Wrex and Garrus approach, sending them off on their way. Three more heavies stood watch, their weapons already trained on the new arrivals.

Wrex laughed. "Nice place ya got here, Aria."

Aria smirked as she slowly rose to her feet. Her half-jacket fluttered, the tight black strands of fabric across her mostly exposed chest and stomach flexing with her muscles. _S_ _he's strong, tough probably,_ Garrus thought, _h_ _as a strong sexual presence. But she flaunts it. Shepard had greater strength, but never showed it off except in jest. She had greater beauty too, but never flaunted it. Spirits, what is wrong with me? Now is not the time for this, Garrus._

"Wrex. You're looking vital. Especially compared to when I last saw you." Aria crossed her arms.

"Hah! After spending two days and blowing up a space station trying to find you, I'm sure I was just the prettiest krogan you'd ever seen."

She brushed aside her bodyguards, stepping to within a few inches of Wrex's face. "If you came here just to bring up the past, you'll find your stay here very short lived. What do you really want?"

"I'm cashing in a favor."

"That's rich. I don't recall you helping me take over Omega. What do I owe you?"

Wrex chuckled. "Asari have better memories than that." He leaned in close, whispering to her, "maybe Aria, boss of Omega doesn't owe anyone anything. But Aleena the mercenary still owes Urdnot Wrex a debt."

Her tattooed brows furrowed. "I should've figured you'd bring that up. That was a long time ago. And thanks to me, you had the easiest source of income I can think of."

"It was an easy job. But I'm here for some information."

At this point they lowered their voices to the point that Garrus could no longer pick it up, even with his visor running its "lip reader" application. All he knew was next, Aria slammed a data pad into Wrex's chest. "We're done here. No more favors. I don't care if you stay on Omega, but if you try to bring up 'old times' again, you'll be reduced to ash faster than you can blink." Aria slinked back to her couch, spreading herself across it with an air of authority. "We're done here, boys."

Wrex grabbed Garrus by the arm, leading him back down to the main floor of Afterlife. He shoved the data pad into the turian's hands. "Alright. This is a dossier on every boss and merc in the Terminus worth rubbing two credits together for. I hope you know what to do with it."

Garrus's mandibles flexed as he looked over the list, a wealth of information he'd have killed for as a C-Sec officer. "I don't plan to let you, or anyone else down. Thank you, Wrex."

The krogan shrugged. "Well, I suppose before I go save my planet from its own stupidity, I'll need some ryncol. You wanna get a drink?"

"Maybe another time. I have some work to do."

Wrex sighed deeply. "Still an uptight asshole. See you around the galaxy, Garrus."

* * *

To be continued in Garrus Effect: The Archangel


End file.
